Islands of Decolonial Love

Stories and Songs
  • ISBN-13: 9781894037884
  • PRICE: $19.00
  • Paperback, 148 pages
“Islands of Decolonial Love is the sort of book I have been looking for all my life–the kind of book that is going to make me a good writer, a good listener, a good citizen–it is going to wake up everything that is brilliant in everyone that reads it.” — Lee Maracle

In this debut collection of short stories renowned writer and activist Leanne Simpson vividly explores the lives of contemporary Indigenous Peoples and communities, especially those of her own Nishnaabeg nation.

Found on reserves, in cities and small towns, in bars and curling rinks, canoes and community centres, doctors offices and pickup trucks, Simpson’s characters confront the often heartbreaking challenge of pairing the desire to live loving and observant lives with a constant struggle to simply survive the historical and ongoing injustices of racism and colonialism.

These voices that are rarely recorded but need to be heard, and incorporating the language and history of her people, Leanne Simpson’s Islands of Decolonial Love is a profound, important, and beautiful book of fiction.

wasaeyaban (Anishinaabe)–the first light, just before dawn. I don’t think writers make up stories, stories run around looking for a writer to tell them (if they are any good) otherwise they tend to be trite in the telling. I am glad these stories found the delicate hand and steel-wired beautiful voice of Leanne Simpson to bring them alive. Leanne is a listener and she was fully awake when she listened at dawn to all these stories and committed them to these trees (right, that would be pages, even though pages are really trees) and birthed a marvelous collection of stories (that are also poems) to illuminate the Anishinaabe experience in a way that turns the light on inside the reader–not just any light, but dawn’s first light, the light that counts, the light that stories our very lives, makes us plan something completely different from the sticky mud of same ol’, same ol’. Islands of Decolonial Love is the sort of book I have been looking for all my life–the kind of book that is going to make me a good writer, a good listener, a good citizen–it is going to wake up everything that is brilliant in everyone that reads it. — Lee Maracle

 

Download all songs Download

Download individual songs: she hid him in her bones | leaks | smallpox, anyone | identity impaired | jiibay or aandizooke | spacing | ishpadinaa | she sang them home | a love song for attawapiskat

nick ferrio – dobro
tara williamson – piano and vocals
sarah decarlo – keyboard
melody mckiver – viola
a tribe called red – instrumental from “woodcarver”
sean conway – guitar
leanne simpson – vocals
cris derksen – “war cry”, movement I and II

instrumentals and poetry for all tracks except spacing and the works by a tribe called red and cris derksen were recorded at the narrows with sound engineer james mckenty. spacing was recorded by chris culgin at ephram. all tracks were mixed by james mckenty and mastered by harris newman at greymarket mastering.

special thanks to: steve daniels, tara williamson, nick ferrio, james mckenty, john k. samson, chris culgin, cara mumford, rulan tangen, minowe simpson, nishna simpson, marrie mumford, sarah decarlo, melody mckiver, sean conway, ryan mcmahon, jarrett martineau, eric ritskes, sara roque, cris derksen, a tribe called red, doug williams, patti shaughnessy, susan blight, indigenous waves radio, aaron mason, aaron mason photography and the aboriginal arts program of the ontario arts council.

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson is a researcher, writer, and educator of Mississauga and Scottish ancestry. She is a member of the gidigaa bzhiw dodem and a citizen of the Nishnaabeg nation. Leanne holds a PhD from the University of Manitoba and is the past director of Indigenous Environmental Studies at Trent University. Her research interests include Indigenist theory and methodology, Indigenous political cultures and traditional governance, Nishnaabeg women, Indigenous Knowledge, and Indigenous philosophies on land and the environment. Leanne currently teaches at the Centre for World Indigenous Knowledge Athabasca University and has previously taught at Trent University, the University of Victoria, the University of Manitoba, and Tampere University in Finland.


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